Teresa Medeiros (21 page)

“Och,” he grunted, leering at the girl. “Ain’t nothin’ finer on a chill day than a jug of ale and a warm tit.”

When his crass remark failed to garner the laughter he expected, he slammed the jug down on the table. “What’s got into the lot o’ ye? There’s tits eno’ to go ’round, ain’t they?” He peered down the girl’s bodice. “Last time I checked, ever’ wench had two.” He roared at his own jest.

One of his companions cleared his throat. “Eh, Fergus …”

It was too late. Sabrina tapped Fergus gently on the shoulder. “Pardon me for interrupting your charming and poetic discourse on the merits of a woman’s bosom, Mr. MacDonnell, but I have need of you in my chamber.”

The flailing dice players rolled to halt. The man who’d been knocked unconscious by the jug of whisky stirred with interest.

Fergus swiveled on the bench, dumping the occupant of his lap to the floor. “Me, lass? Ye’ve need o’ me? In yer chamber?”

She smiled sweetly and crooked her finger at him. “In the worst way.”

Giving the men a wide-eyed look that clearly said
How did I get so bloody lucky?
he tucked his thumbs into his kilt and strutted after her like a bantam cock about to raid a henhouse.

Enid had prepared the chamber as Sabrina had requested. A delicate china tea set was laid out on a tablecloth of Valenciennes. A piping hot pot of tea sat on a starched doily. Steam wafted from its graceful spout.

“Mr. MacDonnell?” Sabrina gestured toward the nearest chair. Fergus acted as if he hadn’t heard, so she repeated herself.

Starting with surprise, he ducked his head shyly. “Ain’t no one e’er called me mister before. Me friends call me Fergie, but ye can call me darlin’ if ye like.” He winked at her, but without the bracing presence of his cronies, the gesture lost some of its leer. Sabrina deliberately overlooked his impudence.

He perched on the edge of the chair and peered around, obviously intimidated by the feminine trappings of the chamber.

Sabrina poured him a cup of tea. “Do you take sugar in your tea, sir?”

“Don’t know,” he admitted. “Ain’t never had no tea. Malt’s always been me drink o’ choice.”

Sabrina dropped in three of the grainy lumps, suspecting his jaded tastes might veer toward the sensual. She pressed the wafer-thin cup into his hand. His florid palm dwarfed it. He took a hasty slurp, then crinkled his nose in a poorly hidden grimace.

Sabrina hid her own smile behind a sip of tea. As Fergus lowered the cup, his hand shook violently. The cup rattled against the saucer; tea sloshed over its rim. His broad face flushed. His gaze darted toward the door as if to seek escape.

Sabrina stared, fascinated, into his beady, red-rimmed eyes, seeing for the first time the panic in their depths. The revelation stunned her. Why, this crude, blustering man was afraid of women! No, not afraid. Petrified! He’d simply chosen to hide that fear behind
crass jibes and a randy reputation. Pity welled in her heart.

Knowing she was taking a terrible chance, she reached over to pat his trembling hand. “It’s all right, Mr. MacDonnell. There’s nothing to be afraid of. I swear I’ll be gentle with you.”

Early that evening as a crisp wind blew down from the north and the slate sky began to spit snow, Morgan dragged his exhausted body into the buttery. He’d spent his entire day wrestling with the Cameron sheep, penning them into the narrow glen that would serve as their home during the harsh winter to come. The rock walls would shelter them from the worst of the weather. Come spring, they would be freed to roam the heathered heath as a sign of fresh hope for his clan’s prosperity.

He had never dreamed sheep could be such befuddled creatures. He and his men would barely get one hemmed in before another would wander away.

He peeled his plaid from his shoulders, stripping down to the waist. His muscles throbbed in protest. Groaning, he cupped his hands in a barrel and splashed cool spring water over his face, slicking back his hair as the water ran in soothing trickles down his chest. No matter how exhausted he was, he always stopped to wash before joining Sabrina in her chamber. Too many times in his life he’d heard the words “filthy, stinkin’ MacDonnell” hissed behind his back by those not bold enough to say them to his face.

As he patted his face dry, his gaze flicked upward to the beamed ceiling. The pleasure he took in knowing Sabrina awaited him both delighted and alarmed him. Her chamber had become his sanctuary after grueling hours of bellowing orders at men so unaccustomed to a decent day’s work that they lapsed into naps over their shovels and staffs. Oddly enough, it wasn’t her stories he anticipated, but the teasing melody of her voice. It wasn’t the games, but the matching of his mind to her clever wit. He had thought to find solace
and peace in her chamber only to discover a challenge more exhilarating than battle had ever been.

He straightened, wincing as fresh pain shot across his shoulders. Perhaps Sabrina would use her supple fingers to work out the kinks in his muscles. She had refused him nothing yet. An unbidden smile stole across his face. If he continued to prove to her a MacDonnell could be more than just a rutting beast, she might soon invite him into her bed, not out of charity or duty, but out of desire. Then he had every intention of sliding between those crisp sheets and her milky thighs and making her his own.

Morgan’s groin grew hot and heavy at the thought, pulsing in time to his anticipation. He closed his eyes, allowing himself a moment to savor the raw power of the enticing vision. A shock jolted him as an arm snaked around his waist. Grubby, chipped fingernails raked his bare abdomen. Another hand slithered up his thigh to grope crudely beneath the plaid. Long hair tickled his back.

“Alwyn,” he muttered.

“Aye, Morgan. ’Tis yer own bonny Alwyn.” An excited coo escaped her. “Right and ready, ye be. But ye always were, weren’t ye, love?”

Dodging her persistent fingers, he swung around. He could smell the fresh taint of another man’s sex on her. It withered his desire faster than a dash of icy water.

She was already drawing up the skirts of her gown. He shoved them back down. “I thought I’d explained myself, lass. You can’t go around droppin’ your drawers every time I walk into a room. ’Tis not seemly. I’ve a wife now.”

“Go on with ye, Morgan. Ye know I don’t wear drawers.” She stalked him like a big, blond Highland wildcat, backing him against the barrel and shoving her ample breasts against his chest. “The timin’ is near perfect. Yer precious wife willna disturb us. If she can entertain another man in her chamber, what’s the harm in us stealin’ a wee bit o’ fun for ourselves?”

“Another man?”

The ominous note in Morgan’s voice sent Alwyn into a cautious retreat. “Aye. I thought ye knew. Eve told me he’s been up there for hours.”

“Hours?” A haze of red descended over Morgan’s eyes. His ears roared.

Alwyn backed away, her eyes widening in alarm. Her own numerous dalliances had never troubled Morgan. How was she to suspect his wee, monkey-faced wife could provoke such a fury?

Morgan wasn’t furious. He was rabid. Tripping over his trailing plaid, he shoved past Alwyn and burst into the hall. Smoke and silence hung over the cavernous chamber, both too thick to be cut with a claymore. Sweet Christ! Did they all believe he had been cuckolded by his Cameron bride?

His clansmen gazed into the fire, shuffled their feet, swirled their whisky in their mugs. Not one of them would look him in the eye. Only Eve dared to heft her chipped mug in a mocking toast.

As he crossed the hall, Morgan slowed his strides to a more dignified pace, feeling their gazes bore into his exposed skin.

Behind him, the wagers flew in frantic whispers and hushed tones as his clansmen speculated on whether he would strangle his fickle wife or plant a pistol ball in her black little heart.

As soon as Morgan was out of sight of the hall, he thundered into a run. He took the crumbling steps two at a time, then stopped dead outside the door of Sabrina’s chamber. Over the gently plucked notes of the clarsach and the thud of his heart in his ears, he could hear a man’s deep baritone and a woman’s sweet soprano blended in a melody so poignant it would have made the most ruthless of warriors weep.

The man sang:

Sabrina countered with:

Another man was singing with his wife. Morgan didn’t realize it was the first time he had thought of her not as Sabrina, or brat, or a bloody Cameron nuisance, but as
his wife
. Rage and helplessness buffeted him. The sheer intimacy of their melded voices was somehow more damning than fornication itself.

He threw open the door. Two startled pairs of eyes surveyed him. He suddenly realized what a fool he must appear—half naked, hair dripping, jaw dropped in astonishment.

He could not help but gape to discover the angel’s baritone belonged to a man with a soul more charred than Satan’s.

Fergus MacDonnell hefted his squat bulk from the pillow at Sabrina’s feet and offered her a rusty bow. “Thank ye for the tea, me lady. I’m much obliged.”

She laid the clarsach aside. Fergus’s crude paw swallowed her dainty hand. “Thank
you
, Mr. MacDonnell, for sharing those charming Highland ballads. My husband will appreciate them during the long winter nights to come. Won’t you, dear?”

It took Morgan a full minute to realize she was addressing him. “Huh?”

Fergus paused in the doorway to give him a chiding frown. “Don’t grunt at yer wife, lad. Ye’re not a bloody swine.” He tossed the dangling tail of the plaid over Morgan’s shoulder. “Ye shouldna go about half dressed in the presence of a lady. Did yer da teach ye no manners a-tall?”

Fergus slapped him fondly on the back before swaggering off down the corridor. Sabrina bustled around the chamber, humming under her breath and blithely gathering teacups as if there weren’t a hall full of MacDonnells below waiting for the thundering report of his pistol.

“Charming man, isn’t he?” She blew a speck of dust off the cream pitcher. “Beneath all that bluster lies the soul of a gentleman.”

Morgan snapped his jaw shut. He’d once seen Fergus suck a mutton bone clean while cleaving off an
enemy’s head with his other hand. “Aye, a regular poet, he is.”

At Morgan’s even tone, Pugsley wiggled under the bed until nothing but his curly little tail was showing.

Morgan gently shut the door behind him. “Would you care to explain his exalted presence in your chamber, lass?”

She polished a teacup on her sleeve, rubbing away Fergus’s grubby fingerprints. “What is there to explain? I invited him to partake of tea with me. He was kind enough to teach me some of your lovely Highland ballads. I knew you would tire of Mama’s English songs rapidly enough.” Her nose wrinkled. “Too many references to routing the shiftless Scots, I fear.”

“Is it an English custom to take tea with a strange man? Alone in your bedchamber?”

“Well, no. But I hardly found the hall suitable for …” She trailed off at the full implication of his words. The teapot slid from her hand and struck the table edge, chipping off the porcelain rose that adorned its surface. Incredulous pain darkened her eyes. “Are you accusing me of …?”

“I’m accusin’ you of nothin’, lass. It’s just that when Alwyn told me—”

“Oh. Alwyn.” Her voice turned dull and lifeless, belying the fierce sparkle of her eyes. “You would believe Alwyn, wouldn’t you? After all, she’s a MacDonnell, isn’t she? Not a sly, deceitful Cameron. And where were you and your darling Alwyn when these accusations were made?”

A flicker of guilt danced across Morgan’s face as he remembered the greedy feel of Alwyn’s fingers around him. The wounded gleam in Sabrina’s eyes deepened.

He swore beneath his breath. “I didn’t lay a hand on her, lass, I swear it.”

Sabrina didn’t even seem to hear him. A shaky laugh escaped her. “I should have expected as much, shouldn’t I? Why should you trust me? After all, there is no depth to which we Camerons will not sink—murdering
our dinner guests, poisoning our bridegrooms. Why should it be such a stretch of the imagination for you to believe I’d whore for your men?”

She turned her back on him, her slender shoulders rigid with fury. Morgan shook his head in grudging admiration. Sabrina had managed to turn both his anger and his jealousy against him. None of his clansmen would dare lift their voices to him in genuine anger, but once again this slip of a girl had proved them all cowards and himself a bloody fool.

He picked up the rose that had chipped from the teapot. If only he had stopped to ponder the absurdity of the accusation. He was always charging in without counting the cost, destroying something precious and fragile in his rash clumsiness—his mother’s life, the Belmont Rose, Sabrina’s pride.

Laying the rose on the table, he padded over to stand in front of her, so close he could feel her breath against his bare chest. Its sweet whisper stirred him as Alwyn’s touch never could. She kept her head bowed, stubbornly refusing to meet his eyes.

“I don’t suppose you’d read me that story you promised? The one about the bonny lass Delilah?”

“I don’t suppose so,” she whispered.

“A game of chess? I swear I won’t toss the board. Not even if you win.”

She shook her head. The silence stretched between them.

Morgan ran a hand through his damp hair, feeling the dead weight of regret settle into his bones. He sank heavily into a chair.

Sabrina had decided her husband was impossible to please, so she decided to please herself. Ignoring Morgan, she sat upon the stool and began to pluck a melody from the clarsach. Inclining her head, she toyed with the bittersweet words of the ballad Fergus had taught her.

Her attempt to pretend Morgan didn’t exist soon failed her. Even motionless and silent, his raw masculine presence commanded the room. Six feet three
inches of brawny Highlander was impossible to ignore, even to someone oblivious of his charms, which, Sabrina regretted keenly, she was not.